I Googled a search for the top 20 inventions in history. Some of those included the wheel, electricity, vaccines, and the computer that I hold in my hand as I write. At some point someone had to say, “There’s more.”

Marty Cooper, an engineer at Motorola, asked a question many years ago, “Why is it that when we want to call or talk to a person, we have to call a place?” From that one question the cell phone was birthed, and our way of communication was forever changed.

One such thinker was a 31-year-old old David in the book of 2 Samuel chapter 5. He was anointed king over Israel many years earlier as a boy, and now all the tribes have come together under one banner to publicly appoint him their king. All of this took place in Hebron. David began his reign at Hebron, and it was a good place for him. He spent seven-and-a-half years there. He had a good thing going, but there’s was one problem, “There was more.”

Hebron was OK, but it wasn’t Jerusalem. David had a good enough life in Hebron, but sometimes good enough can be the enemy of God’s best. A friend of mine once said that “everybody wants Jerusalem, but most will settle for Hebron.” However, we can rest assured that our Jerusalem won’t be handed over to us without a fight. For some of us, our Jerusalem is being inhabited by someone else right now. And that is exactly what David faced with his Jerusalem. Someone else occupied the city, an enemy known as the Jebusites. They not only had control of David’s promise but they taunted, insulted ,and embarrassed him in the process. They told him that he would not take the city and that the blind and lame could defend against him. They basically stuck a finger in his face and laughed at him. So let’s break down this story in 2 Samuel chapter 5 and see where our own battles lie.

If we’re going to take possession of our promise, then we’re going to have to attack it first. When you know it’s yours, then it will be worth the fight. It may be a marriage that you just know you can’t give up on or a debt that must be reduced. It’s worth the fight, so go get it.

Another thing that David did after taking the city was to rename it. He called it “The City of David.” Let’s call our victory and flow in it. Maybe that marriage needs to be referred to as powerful instead of failing. Try calling your child or loved one a pre-Christian rather than lost and going to hell. There’s power in the spoken word. Proverbs tells us that we can build up or destroy with those words. Let’s choose to build, my friends.

Two more points in this story that I want to key in on and those are the taunts of the enemy toward David and the way he won the city. They told him that even the blind and lame could defend against him. Some around us and maybe even a voice inside our own heads will rise up and tell us that it can’t be done. You’ll never take this city. You’re a son or daughter of an alcoholic, an addict or a failure, and you’re destined to walk that same path. Keep in mind that not everything the enemy tells you is true. As a matter of fact, most of what comes out of his mouth is a lie.

Secondly, Jerusalem was protected by a wall that surrounded the city, which may be why the Jebusites felt the lame and blind could protect it. But David and his men chose to enter the city through the water shaft in verse 8. That’s the sewer to you and me. Yes, David crawled through the sewer to take Jerusalem, and he reigned there the remainder of his life.

Is there an enemy occupying a seat at your house? He could be disguised as pride or jealousy or maybe bitterness that has turned into hatred. We’re not going to slap the fingers from our faces, take back our homes, and rename our victories without having to first crawl through the stench of the sewer to get it. Stop calling your situation “I don’t know what to do” and give it a new name known to you as “victory.”

I’ll see you at Christpoint Church this Sunday, at 9 a.m. and 11 a.m., and we can talk more. We’re real people, living real lives, serving a real God. Welcome home.